India ranks 135 out of 146 in Global Gender Gap Index; Iceland Tops

On July 13, 2022, the World Economic Forum (WEF) released the Global Gender Gap Index for 2022, under Global Gender Report 2022, in which India ranks low at 135th place among a total of 146 countries.

• However, India has scored 0.629, on a scale of 0 to 1, which is its 7th highest score in the last 16 years.
• In 2021, India was ranked 140 out of 156 countries with a score of 0.625.
• Iceland (90.8%) leading the global ranking followed by Finland and Norway with 2nd and 3rd place respectively.

Top 3 Economies:

Iceland has topped the list becoming the most gender equal country for the 12th time in a row, by closing more than 90.8% of its gender gap. Although, no country has achieved full gender parity.

European countries such as Ireland (80.4%) and Germany (80.1%) in ninth and tenth positions, respectively. Sub-Saharan African countries Rwanda (81.1%, 6th) and Namibia (80.7%, 8th), along with one Latin American country, Nicaragua (81%, 7th), and one country from east Asia and the Pacific, New Zealand (84.1%, 4th), also take positions in the top 10.

4 Key Dimensions:

The Global Gender Gap Index tracks the world’s progress toward gender parity through 4 sub-indexes viz. Political Empowerment, Health and Survival, Educational Attainment, and Economic Participation and Opportunity.

Following table showing India ranking in 4 sub-indexes:

i.India registers the most significant and positive change to its performance on Economic Participation and Opportunity. In this, India recovered ground since 2021.

ii.On the other hand, India has the lowest ranking on the Health and Survival subindex and is one of five nations with gender inequalities greater than 5%. The other four are China, Pakistan, Azerbaijan, and Qatar.

iii.India also registered a declining score in political empowerment due to the diminishing share of years women have served as head of state for the past 50 years.

• Meanwhile, the percentage of female legislators, senior officials, and managers rose from 14.6% to 17.6%, and the percentage of female professionals and technicians went from 29.2% to 32.9%.

Key Highlights:

i.In 2022, the global gender gap has been closed by 68.1%. At the current rate of progress, it will take 132 years to reach full parity.

ii.According to trends leading up to 2020, the gender gap was set to close within 100 years.

iii.Among the eight regions covered in the report, South Asia ranks the lowest, with only 62.3% of the gender gap closed in 2022.

• South Asia will take the longest to reach gender parity, which is estimated to be likely in 197 years.

iv.The countries behind India are Morocco (136), Qatar (137), Benin (138), Oman (139), Algeria (140), Mali (141), Chad (142), Iran (142), Congo (143), Pakistan (144), and Afghanistan (145).

v.India also ranks poorly among its neighbours and is behind Bangladesh (71), Nepal (96), Sri Lanka (110), Maldives (117) and Bhutan (126).  Only Iran (143), Pakistan (145) and Afghanistan (146) perform worse than India in south Asia.

vi.In India, the labour force participation shrunk for both men (by -9.5 percentage points) and women (-3 percentage points). However, the gender parity score for estimated earned income improved.

Click Here for Official Report

Recent Related News:

i.The Smart Cities Mission and WEF have jointly established a ‘virtual hub for collaboration on urban transformations’ which will leverage the emerging technologies and innovations to transform Indian cities into centres of sustainable, inclusive and resilient growth.

ii.Aam Aadmi Party(AAP) leader Raghav Chadha, Member of Parliament (Rajya Sabha) from Punjab, Edelweiss Mutual Fund(MF) Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Radhika Gupta and Ukrainian Vice Prime Minister and Minister of Digital Transformation Mykhailo Fedorov are among the World Economic Forum(WEF)’s Young Global Leaders(YGLs) Class of 2022.

About World Economic Forum (WEF):

Establishment– 1971
Founder and Executive Chairman– Klaus Schwab
Headquarters– Geneva, Switzerland